Deseret Alphabet
Book of Mormon

Deseret Alphabet Book of Mormon

In the mid-1800s the Salt Lake Valley was being populated by European immigrants, many speaking nothing but their native languages. Brigham Young saw the need for a way to help them learn to speak English. The phonetic Deseret alphabet was developed to assist in this cause. A committee from the University of Deseret (now the University of Utah) organized the effort. Four books were published in the Deseret language, including two readers for learning the language, a selection of The Book of Mormon, and the entirety of The Book of Mormon. After Brigham Young died, the project lost funding and momentum and the language never caught on.

This book is on loan from Church History Library in Salt Lake City, UT